U.S. Cotton: Small Gains to Start the Week

Barchart: Cotton futures closed 6 to 22 points higher on Monday, with Dec26 at 80.60 cents (+6 points), Mar27 at 83.81 (+22) and May27 at 85.48 (+18). Crude oil rose about 2% and the dollar index moved higher. The Seam reported sales of 2,539 bales on October 9 at an average of 79.53 cents/lb. The Cotlook A Index was unchanged at 90.65, ICE certified stocks held at 17,756 bales, and the Adjusted World Price stands at 63.81 cents/lb.
Source: Barchart

U.S. Cotton: Quiet Holiday Session as Open Interest Nears Its Record Again

Calcot (Cindy Walters): Cotton closed higher across the board for a second straight session, though the gains have been small: December settled at 80.60 cents, up 6 points, for a two-session gain of 66 points, while the other months rose 18 to 33 points. Volume of 45,477 contracts was at the light end of the year, partly because of the Columbus Day holiday, which closed the bond market and delayed the USDA Crop Progress report to Tuesday. Open interest rose to 389,323 contracts as of Friday, the second highest ever and just 171 contracts short of the record set on September 29, and December open interest increased after nine straight sessions of liquidation. Crude oil rose 2.1% for a third straight gain, on Houthi missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia and with more than 600,000 barrels a day of U.S. Gulf production still offline after Hurricane Isaias, while China's ZCE gained 0.8%. Technically, December closed above its 10-day moving average for a second session, a sign bulls may be trying to dig in, but the Dec/March spread widened to a record 321 points March premium — December's loss of leadership, Calcot notes, has not helped bulls. November options expire on Friday, when the weekly export report, delayed by the holiday, will also be released.
Source: Calcot

Global: Mambo Sees December Settling Around 80 Cents as Brazil Gains Ground

Mambo: Mambo's latest market review expects December 2026 to find its equilibrium around 80 cents, and reads the roughly 3-cent December-March carry as a possible sign of slowing demand. The larger U.S. crop in the latest WASDE adds to the bearish pressure, against a backdrop of a strong dollar, high oil prices, rising inflation and interest rates, and geopolitical uncertainty from U.S. trade policy and sanctions to Ukraine and the U.S. midterms. In Brazil, lower basis levels have accelerated sales, with exports expected to exceed 3.5 million tonnes this year and Brazil gaining share in Asia, particularly in China, which needs to rebuild its reserves; U.S. growers, with higher production costs, may struggle to match those basis levels. In India, El Niño hurt the monsoon, production is estimated at 30.5 million bales of 170 kg, and import duties are expected to return at the end of October despite higher prices. In West Africa, where quality is improving, congestion at the port of Abidjan is preventing cotton from shipping within reasonable time. Between September 28 and October 12, December fell 3.13% to 80.13 cents, the Cotlook A Index 3.31% to 90.65 and EUR/USD 1.59% to 1.1176.
Source: Mambo

U.S. Cotton: Quality, Not Production, Is the Bigger Worry

PCCA: Cotton finished last week better than expected, with December up 166 points to 80.54 cents after recovering from a sharp drop on USDA's surprise increase in the U.S. crop, but PCCA says selling across agriculture, Wednesday's inflation data and questions about the crop could still test the recovery. USDA's larger estimate has raised eyebrows given the high abandonment of dryland acres across the Southwest, and attention is now on hurricane damage in the eastern Cotton Belt, where the extent of quality losses is still unclear; with rain and open cotton in the Delta and Southeast, quality has become a bigger concern than production. Underneath the price action, speculators kept selling while commercial buyers stepped in at lower prices, and China returned from its holiday with stronger prices. Export sales have been a pleasant surprise, including 56,100 bales booked for 2027/28, mostly by China, though PCCA says more consistent buying is needed to change the demand picture. A hotter-than-expected CPI could revive expectations of a Fed hike this month and support the dollar. On costs, President Trump signed an order temporarily allowing dyed diesel on highways and deferring the federal fuel tax to year-end, though details on implementation are scarce. Tuesday's Crop Progress report was delayed by the holiday.
Source: PCCA

Greece: Futures Seek Balance Around 81 Cents as Mills Stay Subdued

Agronews (Giannis Papadogiannis): New York is recovering from its recent lows and trying to find balance around 81 cents, but the author had expected a stronger rebound and more active buying from spinners, which has not materialised. Rain in Texas has raised concerns about many abandoned fields, though this is not seen as a problem for global fibre supply. In Greece, buyers returned after the sharp fall, but less than expected. Harvest is under way and the crop looks good so far. Buyers are paying 2-3 cents over December 2026 futures, but ginners are finding it hard to reach those levels.
Source: Agronews

Australia: Cotton Australia Defends Its Work to Build Demand

Grain Central: Cotton Australia has responded to criticism from Louis Dreyfus Company's Joe Nicosia, who told the Australian Cotton Conference in August that Australia does not attack the demand side or advocate for its own commodity, and urged it to push for legislation like the proposed U.S. Buying American Cotton Act. Chair Liz Stott said demand is a key priority in the organisation's strategic plan, pointing to its Cotton to Market programme, running since 2013, and to the Australian Cotton Mark, under which 64.5 million units were processed in 2025 — up 92% on 2024 — with more than 50 licensed brands, including new partners Target, Caprice, Big W and Sussan. Cotton Australia has also worked with Textile Exchange and Cascale to get Australian production data into sustainability benchmarks, and as a founding member of the Make the Label Count coalition helped secure a review of how the EU's Product Environmental Footprint method treats natural fibres against synthetics. Stott noted that the organisation is funded mostly by voluntary grower levies without the government backing U.S. cotton enjoys, and suggested LDC could join producers in advocating for cotton as a natural fibre, particularly on microplastics.
Source: Grain Central

Australia: India Becomes the Top Market for Australian Cotton

Daily Cargo News: India became the largest destination for Australian cotton in August, according to the Australian Cotton Shippers Association, with its share of shipments jumping to 28% from 11% in July after the removal of an 11% import duty on Australian cotton, while China's share fell from 51% to 27%. The association's Arthur Spellson called the drop in China symptomatic of lacklustre demand from China and most other markets amid macroeconomic weakness and geopolitical uncertainty, adding that the Xi-Trump meeting disappointed with no Chinese purchases of U.S. cotton, which helped drive September's price fall. Monthly shipments have held at just over 550,000 bales since June, bringing exports to just over 2 million bales by the end of August — about 45% of the estimated 4.5 million-bale crop — with as many as 3 million bales still to ship including carry-over. Spellson described the crop as of excellent quality but particularly difficult to market; lower prices have drawn back mainly buyers with immediate needs, and the market carry helps merchants hold stock. With the 2027 crop seen at around 3 million bales and harvest problems in the U.S. and Brazil, he warned that higher grades could become hard to source.
Source: Daily Cargo News

Global: How Tariff Costs Travel Down the Cotton Supply Chain

RFD-TV: Trade analyst Robert Antoshak of Gherzi Americas explains that although U.S. importers pay tariffs at the border, they often press overseas factories for lower prices to recover part of the cost, while retail prices can still rise for consumers. Discounts that factories grant under tariff pressure may become part of their standard pricing, leaving suppliers little room to win them back even if importers later receive tariff refunds. Apparel orders are shifting among Asian suppliers — Bangladesh, Vietnam, Cambodia and Indonesia — rather than returning to U.S. factories, keeping textile demand concentrated overseas. For U.S. growers, Antoshak says, the key question is where mill activity ultimately settles, since that is what drives demand for raw cotton.
Source: RFD-TV

Global: Better Cotton Turns Itself into a Regenerative Standards System

WWD / Yahoo: The Better Cotton Initiative (BCI) announced that it now operates as a regenerative standards system, after two years of restructuring that place greater emphasis on regenerative agriculture in how farmers set and meet continuous-improvement targets. The standard, which covers more than a fifth of world cotton, still does not ban synthetic pesticides or fertilisers outright, but requires the most hazardous pesticides to be phased out and makes soil health, cover cropping and biodiversity measures mandatory alongside integrated pest management. BCI has also acquired the team and technology behind the Co:Farm data platform from Materra to simplify field-level data collection, and a SureHarvest review found its existing framework already largely aligned with leading regenerative standards. In India, a project with H&M in Gujarat is training more than 12,000 farmers, with 1,700 tonnes of traceable lint linked to H&M's supply chain. The move follows scrutiny of BCI's certification credibility, notably Earthsight's 2024 report on cotton linked to illegal deforestation in Brazil's Cerrado, and BCI's own impact report flags continued hazardous pesticide use in Brazil, its largest single source, and on large farms. The system will be formally launched at this week's Textile Exchange Conference in Vancouver.
Source: WWD / Yahoo

India: Mills Weigh Domestic Against Imported Cotton

Commodity Board: India enters 2026/27 with modest production, held back by slightly lower yields after below-normal rainfall in western and central regions, while domestic mill use is expected to edge higher on export-oriented textile and apparel orders, leaving a narrower exportable surplus and a comparatively tight domestic balance. Cotton prices have risen notably this year, but yarn prices have risen faster, squeezing spinning margins. Mills are treating imports as a strategic hedge, switching between domestic and foreign cotton according to delivered cost, quality and yarn economics, with imports more attractive for higher counts when local high-grade cotton is scarce, and industry bodies have called for an extension of the duty-free import window. With global consumption expected to exceed production, world stocks are not large enough to fully cushion a domestic shortfall. Traders are waiting for new-crop arrival and ginning data before turning more bullish, and stable post-monsoon weather should support harvesting, although storms or heat spikes could affect micronaire and colour in late pickings.
Source: Commodity Board

Uganda: Cotton 64 Years After Independence

The Independent (Kampala) / AllAfrica: Marking 64 years of independence, the article looks at how far Ugandan cotton has fallen from its past role: output reached 84,000 tonnes in 1969, before collapsing to 14,000 tonnes in 1976 and 2,000 tonnes in 1987 amid political and economic turmoil, and reforms in the 1990s brought only a partial recovery. Where cooperatives once ran 53 ginneries, by 2015/16 only two integrated textile firms were operating, neither at full capacity, hit by high costs, obsolete machinery, unreliable power and competition from imports and second-hand clothing. Farm-gate prices fell to about 1,500 shillings per kilogram in December 2025 from 2,500 the previous year, with some farmers selling to middlemen for as little as 1,200 shillings because of buyer delays and lack of storage; one grower on 1.5 acres saw her earnings drop from 1.75 million to 1.2 million shillings. The Cotton Development Organisation ceased operations in January 2025, its functions moving to the agriculture ministry. Reviving the sector, the article concludes, requires competitive prices, dependable buyers, timely payment, and affordable electricity and inputs — cotton must earn enough to justify the land, labour and time it demands.
Source: AllAfrica

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